Seduced by Crimson (3 page)

"She's in her twenties now and lives in Chinatown."

"But—"

"But nothing," interrupted Hank. "Demons are here on Earth. If the Draig-Uisge can stop—"

"It's in her blood." Patrick used his words to clarify his purpose. Somehow stating his meaning out loud made it that much clearer exactly what he had to do. "She bleeds and creates power."

Stunned silence. Then Hank cleared his throat. "How much power?"

"How much blood?" asked Slick.

Patrick shrugged. "Enough power to un-turn vamps and werewolves, according to that monk's journal."

"Whoa…" Hank murmured. Patrick didn't stay to respond. Instead, he pushed past them out the door. He knew without looking that the two would fall into flanking positions behind him. They did, but Slick could not keep silent.

"Patrick! How much blood?"

He growled, annoyed with her for the question, annoyed with himself for having to answer. "All of it," he finally spit out. "Unless I can find a different way."

Slick's voice came from just behind his right shoulder, her words a little breathless as she tried to keep up with his rapid pace. "
Is
there a different way?"

"Maybe." He'd studied the texts. Hell, he'd been the one to find the texts. He'd cross-referenced, re-translated, even sent it to other druids around the globe in the hope that he was wrong. But he and his father were the foremost experts in arcane druid spells. They hadn't gotten it wrong.

Closing the demon gate required three things. First, an energy source—Xiao Fei's blood. Second, a shaper of energy. That was the Draig-Uisge's special talent, beyond killing people. And lastly, a way for the Draig-Uisge and the power source to sync up. They had to merge their energies such that he could shape her power. How to do that? They had to have sex.

Which meant he had to copulate with a complete stranger, bleed her during the act, and then use her energy to close the demon gate. AH before the demons found and killed them both. And if he failed, then Earth would fall to the beasts who had just massacred his dearest friends and family.

Crimson
City
had better watch out. The Draig-Uisge was off to spill some blood.

They were almost ready for her by the time she made it inside Wang's Health Emporium. The acupuncture tables were not even remotely intended to restrain a vampire, but she worked here and the space was available—her companions had improvised with leather belts and rope. Assuming the two creatures remained unconscious, everything should be fine.

"How this gonna work?" Old Mr. Chen hovered nervously at the edge of the room where Donny lay.
Good question
, Xiao Fei thought with a grimace. Unfortunately, she couldn't say so out loud. This was the man's son after all.

She dredged up a reassuring smile that didn't fool the old man for one second. Then she abandoned it in favor of a shrug and honesty. "I've never done this before. I don't know if it will work at all. There was a monk in Cambodia who thought we could do it—change a vamp back. But we never got a chance to try. We Phoenix Tears never got a chance to try a lot of things."

Mr. Chen nodded. He already knew this. They'd gone over it a million times. "Your blood," he said.

She nodded and crossed to the unconscious boy. And he was a boy, she thought, as she stared at the slack-jawed vampire. His skin was unfed-pasty, and in sleep it sagged a bit and gave him a more childish look. Sad.

Because it was suffocatingly hot in the tiny room, Xiao Fei rolled up the sleeves of her black turtleneck. She rarely revealed her arms to anyone, and certainly not when she was out monster hunting. Still, there was little choice. She stared at Donny's face, moving slowly into position. Mr. Chen craned his neck to watch, his wrinkled eyes wide as he tried to see.

Xiao Fei looked up. "This may not be pretty, Mr. Chen. And it may not—"

"I stay." He was adamant.

Xiao Fei nodded. At least Mrs. Chen wasn't here. Apparently the woman was at home, crying herself to sleep over the loss of her son, blissfully ignorant that something unheard-of was being attempted in
Crimson
City
tonight: unturning a vampire.

Xiao Fei put the razored thimble on her left thumb, then began the chant. She kept it soft, knowing the prayer itself had no effect. She had long since stopped believing in a beneficent deity—Buddha or otherwise. But the words helped focus her thoughts and drowned out the other noises in her head.

As she chanted, she extended her right forearm so that the third-lowest tattooed teardrop hovered just above Donny's mouth. Then, at the appropriate moment, she pressed her left thumb to the tattoo.

The razor cut was quick and sharp, but she'd long since stopped reacting to pain. Her blood began to flow. Her chant changed to echo the blood-letting. First came a staccato beat to mimic the steady drip, but as her words came faster and more fluid, so too did the stream of blood. Without aid of the razor, the wound widened until it encompassed the whole of that tattooed teardrop. And the red stream poured strong and steady into Donny's mouth.

"Ewww. Gross!"

Xiao Fei didn't stop chanting. But she did slant an annoyed look at Pei Ling, whose large frame rilled the doorway. He'd just planned and executed a vampire slaughter, then set fire to the fangs' remains, and he was grossed out by at a little blood? It amused her how squeamish Americans could be.

"Uh, Fei…" he said, his skin going a little green. "You're spilling."

Xiao Fei's attention flew back to her arm. Her blood still poured steadily into Donny's mouth—dead center between the fangs—but the stupid phnong wasn't swallowing. What now?

Fortunately, Mr. Chen had the answer. He stroked his son's throat from chin to clavicle, just as if the boy were a dog who needed to swallow a pill. Stroke. Stroke. Stroke—swallow! She saw it. Mr. Chen saw it and praised Buddha. In the doorway, Pei Ling grunted.

A couple more strokes, a few more swallows, and then the convulsions began. Vamps were strong. Incredibly strong. And no leather belts were going to restrain him, especially as his body began violent spasms.

Donny's eyes flew open, and Xiao Fei saw madness inside. A growl began low in his throat that quickly built into a howl both inhuman and piercingly loud.

"Damn," Pei Ling cursed. "He'll bring more fangs!"

Xiao Fei felt the same fear, but she couldn't help. She was a small Cambodian refugee, too small to restrain Donny or muffle his cries. Besides, she had to focus and close her wound or the entire floor would soon be covered with her blood.

Pop
! The belt across Donny's chest burst. No way was he going to stay restrained.

Mr. Chen pressed down on his son's shoulders. He spoke a garbled litany of pleas, prayers, and admonitions to behave, but he was old and not very strong. If Donny got his arm free, he might very well kill his father in his confusion.

Then Pei Ling was there, in a headfirst dive on top of Donny. It was a dangerous place to be—neck exposed on a crazed vampire—but Xiao Fei had never questioned her friend's willingness to be foolish in the pursuit of a greater good. That too was very ABC.

She reached out to help, but her hands were slick with her own blood. Xiao Fei had to concentrate. She had to close her wound. She wouldn't be good to anyone otherwise.

Stepping back, she forced herself to close her eyes and concentrate. The sealing chant came difficult and slow. It was hard to block out the grunts and howls of the scuffle, but she did and remained focused. That was her true power, after all. Mental focus. Prayerful attitude.

Her skin sealed. She felt the rush of warmth as health returned to her wrist and palm. She was whole once again. She opened her eyes, only now realizing the other sounds had ended. No feral growls. No frantic pleas. Were they all dead?

The first thing she saw was Pei Ling still atop Donny. His skin was slick with sweat, but his chest rose and lowered with breaths, and his face glowed pink with healthy blood flow. Beneath him Donny lay completely unmoving, but with steadily clearing eyes. Beside them both, Mr. Chen stared hopefully into his son's eyes.

Donny was the first to speak. "What the fuck are you doing?" he growled—but in a completely human way.

Quick as lightning, Mr. Chen flicked him on the temple. "Shut up. We're listening."

"Ow!" Donny complained. "That hurt!"

Pei Ling lifted his head and grinned. "We have a heartbeat!"

"Are you sure?" Xiao Fei leaned forward. She hadn't believed it was really possible. Not until this moment.

Pei Ling rolled off Donny, who grunted in relief. "Listen for yourself."

Mr. Chen was there long before Xiao Fei could make herself move. He pressed his ear to his son's chest. A moment later, his grin told the story. "My son," he gasped, then abruptly began to cry even as he flicked Donny's belly in punishment. "How could scare us so, you stupid boy? Why would you talk to those vampires? What were you thinking? I'll tell you what you were thinking? Foolishness! Stupid, stupid…"

The man went on and on, ranting despite his son's protests. It was just another parent-child argument in Chinatown, and Xiao Fei was weak with pleasure at the sound.

"Are you all right?" Pei Ling asked, his large hand warm on her elbow.

She nodded, unable to speak.

"Can you do the other one? You don't have to, you know. We can just kill him. It's all he deserves—"

"No!" she snapped, forcing her knees to straighten.

"You don't punish a patient for what he does from dementia. We won't kill this one either." She didn't like vamps, but rogues… if she could save this one, maybe things would change.

Pei Ling sighed, his whole body shifting. He looked her in the eye. "Vampirism isn't the same thing as dementia, Fei."

She pushed his supportive arm away. "It's a disease, nothing more. And I now have a cure."

So saying, she mentally reinforced her spine with steel and made herself walk to the next treatment room. Two more members of the team were there, standing guard over their prisoner. They looked relaxed and happy, flushed with success.

"It's not over yet," she snapped, and was gratified to see them jump to attention. For a moment they even looked like real soldiers. Then she turned her attention to Stan.

This vampire was a lot healthier than Donny. Even with the rapidly healing bullet wounds, his skin was pink in color, and his body looked lean in the way of a fighting dog. His face was handsome, angular and sexy. He looked like a Hollywood bad boy.

"Some woman cried long and hard over this one," she said.

Pei Ling grunted over her right shoulder. "These leather straps won't be enough. I'll get the ones from Donny."

He didn't take long. And yet, Xiao Fei was jittery by the time he was finished.

"Stay close!" Pei Ling ordered the others. "And don't vomit."

Xiao Fei felt her lips curl into a smile. Trust Pei Ling to remind everyone just how young he really was. Still, he deserved the respect the others gave him; he was smart and driven, if a bit squeamish. She began the chant.

This time, she used the second-to-last teardrop above her wrist. Her blood flowed, and amazingly the phnong swallowed on his own. Once. Twice. Five times in total before the convulsions began.

Pei Ling was prepared. The extra straps held in part because he and the two others clutched down whatever they could. That allowed Xiao Fei to pour more blood into the patient's mouth. Which was when the screaming began. Howls, screeches, bellows of agony—all of it came from the phnong. They were bestial sounds, inhuman, and yet they had one of Xiao Fei's helpers in tears. Pei Ling merely grew grimmer as he put all of his weight into holding down the vamp's shoulders.

It took a lot longer this time. And the vampire clearly suffered agonies while the conversion went on. And on. And on. Everyone in the room was shaking by the time it was over. Sweat and fear and blood-smell poisoned the air. Then, finally, Stan surrendered to unconsciousness.

"Heartbeat," Pei Ling said, his voice rough with strain.

"The bullet wounds aren't healing like before either," another team member piped up.

Xiao Fei nodded. "Human frailty returns. We should probably get him to a hospital."

"I'll do it," Pei Ling volunteered, his voice strengthening with purpose. "I'm gonna be up all night anyway." He turned his grimace into a wink. "Archeology exam tomorrow." He was studying to get out of this neighborhood, to better himself. Through education he would take control of his life. She felt a flash of jealousy.

"Really?" Xiao Fei strove to make her voice normal, even casual. "Which region?"

He shook his head. "All of them. Curating."

She nodded as if she understood. Some educational directions were beyond the realm of her experience. But Pei seemed to find his work fascinating, so she pretended interest while they all managed to awkwardly carry the ex-vamp to Pei's car.

The others split up, one to help Pei, the other to help Donny and his dad. A half hour later, they were all gone. Which left Xiao Fei alone to clean up the shop. She wanted to erase all evidence of their activities, so she was extra careful. She even went outside to kick at the vamp ashes in the street.